This article argues that China's foreign investor complaints system constitutes ‘state-centric investment mediation’. The Rules on Handling Complaints of Foreign-Invested Enterprises, which entered into force on 1 October 2020, place a state agency in the position of facilitating negotiations between a foreign investor and the agency being complained against. The prospects for this complaints system depend on how the state-as-mediator dynamic is perceived by foreign investors. To this end, it will be argued that settlement agreements reached pursuant to this system may be enforceable under the Singapore Convention on Mediation in certain circumstances. Investors and government entities operating similar systems worldwide should be cognisant of the broad drafting terminology of the Singapore Convention. Moreover, it is proposed that further clarification of the procedural rules and the inclusion of China's foreign-related dispute resolution institutions may enhance investor confidence and encourage use of the complaints system.

This article seeks to ascertain the difference between the agreements forbidden by law under section 24(a) and those intended to defeat the law under section 24(b) of the Malaysian Contracts Act 1950. Even though both subsections (a) and (b) cater to different types of illegality, the courts in Malaysia have often been applying them together without giving reasons why they do so. Their conjoined application prevails perhaps because there has been no convincing explanation of their differences, particularly when considered in the context of the common law doctrine of sham. This article attempts to fill that gap. The article suggests that 24(a) deals with the agreements that are expressly or impliedly forbidden by law, while 24(b) applies to sham contracts. This proposition is based on the analysis of the common law doctrine of sham and recent court decisions.

How did intellectual property (IP), a private right born out of European Enlightenment ideals, take root in Vietnam's socialist legal framework, and what influence does Vietnam's Soviet legacy still have on its IP law? The clandestine triumph of IP rights in Vietnam is remarkable, given the system's former propensity for collective ownership and limited private property rights. Vietnam's approach to IP rights has changed with economic liberalisation: while external pressure prompted the initial adoption of IP laws, national interest and global reputation enhancement are now driving the effort. At the height of communism in the 1980s and under Soviet domination, IP laws reflected socialist ideology and the characteristics of a command economy. Amid Vietnam's quest for technological advancement, the importance of patents has grown. However, public perceptions of the unreliability of the legal system to resolve IP disputes persist, pushing civil disputes towards the government rather than the judiciary. As Vietnam opened economically, its IP regime moved away from overt communism, but communist values are still implicitly incorporated in general principles. Today, adherence to free trade agreements, which require robust IP protection, is driving the modernisation of Vietnam's IP infrastructure.

In embracing corporate rescue, Malaysia introduced Judicial Management (JM) into its company law framework on 1 March 2018. The mechanism was modelled on Singapore's Judicial Management, which itself was based on the United Kingdom (UK) Administration Procedure. Despite its laudable objective of facilitating the rescue of financially distressed companies, the path to JM is paved with obstacles. This article identifies some of these obstacles and examines the issues that give rise to them. At the same time, the article proposes legislative reforms, drawing on comparative laws in Singapore and the UK. For the purposes of this article, three obstacles are examined: first, the power of a secured creditor or debenture holder to veto the JM application; second, the stringent and prohibitive burden imposed on an applicant company caused by the judicial interpretation, at times conflicting, of the provisions governing the application of a JM order; and third, the higher threshold imposed by legislative requirements on creditors’ meeting to approve the JM proposal. These obstacles are encountered at three stages of a JM application: first, at the initial stage of the application; second, in considering the merits of the JM; and third, when the creditors vote to approve the application.

The significance of food is beyond its gastronomic value. Food symbolises a community's enriched past and holds cultural expressions and traditional knowledge. The linkage of food with religious beliefs, geo-climatic factors, social standards, and various health benefits builds the reputation of the food, which is essentially attributable to its geographic origin. Following the ratification of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), the contracting states that have enacted Geographical Indications (GI) legislation (particularly those in Asia) have come forward to protect foodstuffs as GI in order to safeguard their communities and their traditional knowledge associated with foodstuffs. Against this background, the present article attempts to compare foodstuff GIs in eight selected Asian countries with a sui generis system of GI protection as TRIPS compliance. The comparative analysis of the evolution and scope of foodstuff protection, pre-registration and post-registration impact, and quality maintenance provides important insights into convergence and divergence among the selected Asian countries. The study further identifies policy implications for the sustenance of GI.

Pursuant to Article 63 of the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), a state may require other treaty parties to disclose their intellectual property case law ‘of general application’. While most domestic judgments in common law are indeed of general application, civil law systems theoretically employ judgments as reference only. Nevertheless, to value consistency and predictability, the hybridisation of civil law jurisdictions is increasingly leading them to devise special lists of judgments that acquire formal or factual binding status on lower-ranked courts. This trend is particularly evident in China, whose Supreme People's Court's ‘Guiding Cases’ join other specific categories of holdings within ‘Judicial Interpretations’ and further guideline documents that are factually binding domestically. When the United States and the European Union requested, through the World Trade Organization, that China disclose the full range of its case law of general application, China responded that civil law jurisdictions do not issue judgments that are binding beyond the parties. This article examines the limitations and merits of the Chinese stance.

In Thailand, the concept of corporate criminal liability is commonly identified with significant theoretical and practical uncertainties. Only limited attention, however, has been devoted to the notion's historical roots in English legal transfers. This article examines the relevant legislation, court cases, academic literature, and other records. It carves out the continuous English influence on Thai corporate crime doctrine and highlights the legal irritation that occurred along the way. It argues that irritation was not automatic but driven by the Supreme Court, whose choices were shaped by decades of English impact on Thai legal education and practice. The article thereby highlights the dynamics between legal transfers and local drivers of legal development. It expands the growing research on the continued relevance of English law in Thailand and concludes with an outlook on the future of Thai corporate crime doctrine.

The rise and proliferation of International Commercial Courts has become a perceptible trend across the European and Asian continents over the past two decades. One such dispute resolution hub exists within the Astana International Financial Centre, a special jurisdiction within the Republic of Kazakhstan that operates on the basis of common law principles. The Astana International Financial Centre and its Court were modelled on the international financial centres of Dubai and Qatar; however, there are substantial differences between the legal systems of the Gulf States and that of the Republic of Kazakhstan. As a result, the creation of a new court has led to considerable criticism within the local legal community, raising serious doubts as to whether the Kazakh state should be maintaining and financing a ‘caviar-court’ instead of using resources to reform and develop the national judicial system. Nevertheless, despite the scepticism surrounding the financial centre, there is potential for the Astana International Financial Centre and its Court to become a regional dispute resolution hub for post-Soviet countries and the Central Asian region, following the example of Singapore and Dubai.